The use of touch-sensitive surfaces as input devices for computers and other electronic computing devices has increased significantly in recent years. Exemplary touch-sensitive surfaces include touch pads and touch screen displays. Such surfaces are widely used to control applications that require navigation through values in a range of values.
Exemplary modes of navigation through a range of values include identifying a predetermined target value and navigating to the target value, scanning forward through the range of values, scanning backwards through the range of values or skipping from one value to a next value. Exemplary ranges of values that could be navigated through include navigating through periods of time of a predefined length (e.g., days, weeks, months, years, etc.), navigating through units of distance of a predefined size (e.g., centimeters, meters, kilometers, etc.), navigating through units of mass of a predefined size (e.g., grams, kilograms, etc.), navigating through files based on file size (e.g., number of bytes), and navigating through files based on creation date. A user may need to perform such navigation tasks in a diverse range of applications, such as a calendar program (e.g., iCal from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a file management program (e.g., Finder from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), an image management application (e.g., Aperture or iPhoto from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a digital content (e.g., videos and music) management application (e.g., iTunes from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a drawing application, a presentation application (e.g., Keynote from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a word processing application (e.g., Pages from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a website creation application (e.g., iWeb from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), a disk authoring application (e.g., iDVD from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.), or a spreadsheet application (e.g., Numbers from Apple Inc. of Cupertino, Calif.).
But existing methods for navigating through values in a range of values are cumbersome and inefficient. For example, using a sequence of mouse-based inputs to scroll through a large range of values is tedious and creates a significant cognitive burden on a user. In addition, existing methods take longer than necessary, thereby wasting energy. This latter consideration is particularly important in battery-operated devices.